Gaius’s inn had a very long table. When more guests came, he added stools. When there were not enough stools, he set a broad plank firmly on supports. Chris’s sister began counting the cups as soon as she came in. By the time she reached the teens, she had forgotten which ones she had counted.
Gaius did not first ask how much money they had. He asked them to wash their hands and called for more soup. Chris’s father looked uneasy and quietly felt his lighter purse.
“We still have that money to repay,” he told his wife. “Should we eat less?”
Christiana would once have found the question embarrassing. Now she went with him to explain their traveling money and their debt to the host. Gaius listened. The King had provided for travelers, he said, and others in the house were willing to share. “You needn’t leave your children hungry to prove that you mean to repay her. What belongs to the widow must still be honestly returned.”
The table held bread, vegetables, and soft stewed beans. Gaius asked the little girl to take a cup to an old woman farther down. The woman held it and waited for her hands to steady before drinking. Someone beside her moved the hot soup nearer.
After supper they took turns reading the Bible. Gaius read that the Lord received care given to a brother in need as care given to himself. He also read that it was not truthful to claim to love God while refusing to love the brother one could see.
“Do you always have to cook lots of wonderful food to welcome people?” Christiana’s daughter asked.
“No,” Gaius said. “If you have a cup of water, you can give it kindly. But if you have bread and send a hungry person away with nothing but ‘Go in peace,’ that is not the love the Bible teaches.”
Christiana remembered her parties. She had invited many people, but the best chairs were always for those who made her look important. The people outside driving their guests’ wagons often went without even a bowl of warm soup.
When she went to help in the kitchen that evening, a new worker was standing up to eat leftovers. She asked whether he had rested. He had not. Gaius heard and at once told him to sit, taking the pot himself.
Christiana sat beside the worker for a while and listened to him describe his home. Nobody saw her performing a great deed to praise. The soup still steamed, and at last someone was settled comfortably in the extra place at the long table.